The Man On Reach - WARNING, READ COMMENTS BEFORE ANYTHING
by mitchthepug
Summary: A Single Helljumper finds himself stranded on Reach, cut off from the rest of humanity and any hope for rescue. Can he do what needs to be done and stop the Covenant from claiming the artifact that they so desperately desire? Yeah, as the writer, I say that he can. But HOW will he do it? Read to find out. Rated M because it's based off of a video game that's rated M.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

**Deployment + 86:10:04 (ODST Jason Smiths Mission Clock) / Unknown Building, Surface of Reach**

The room had only three pieces of furniture, a large comfortable bed in the corner, a heavy antique table made of solid wood that sat by the door, and the solid wood antique chair to match it. Lance Corporal Jason Smiths was the only man in the building. The ODST was sitting on the bed, leaning against the headboard. It was nearly time for him to call it quits and rest for the night, and he could feel the need for sleep aching inside of him. _I have to sleep, there's nothing more that I can do today. I've already done everything I can to make sure I can hold out until Evac arrives. _

He rose from the bed and crossed to the door, checking to make sure that the deadbolt was securely locked. He then lifted his M90 CAWS 8 gauge Shotgun off the desk, slinging it across his back before slowly sliding what was easily a two hundred pound desk in front of the door. Once he had accomplished his task, he pulled the chain on the dim light that was powered by the car battery he had found while he was out scavenging, ridding the room of the dim glow that it had had before.

He chinned a switch in his helmet, turning on the tactical light on the side of his head. He turned to the bed, unslinging his Shotgun as he approached it. He rested it against the wall with his MA5C Assault Rifle, his M7S SMG, and his tactical pack, which both sat next to the bed. Once they were propped up against the wall, he removed his helmet and switched it to sentry mode so that it'd wake him if it detected anything.

Removing his helmet also deactivated the experimental energy shield that had previously surrounded him. It was a spinoff of the hugely effective energy shield that the Spartans had. In addition, the new and experimental ODST armor was powered by generators that were powered by movement. So as long as he was moving, the suit was recharging the built in high capacity battery that powered his shields. Despite all the new tech in his suit though, the Spartans super soldier armor could still take a hundred times more punishment than theirs could.

Once Jason had set his helmet, he climbed into bed with the rest of his armor and his boots still on. He proceeded to drift towards sleep; comfortable in the knowledge that his large combat knife was still strapped upside down beneath his right arm and the standard issue M6C SOCOM Pistol was still on his thigh.

As he was about to finally close his eyes and rest, Smiths heard a creak from elsewhere in the building that he was currently trying in vain to fall asleep in. _That's the building settling for the night; it is quite old after all. _He reasoned with himself. _Or it could not be that. _

This last thought compelled him to put sleeping off until later, and get back up now. He uncovered himself, throwing the blankets to the side. As Jason stood, he quietly picked his helmet up off of his pack, switching it from sentry to the HUD as he donned it. He decided to forgo turning on the helmet's light for now, instead choosing to use his helmet's night vision capabilities to navigate around the room. He picked up his pack, silently attaching it to the clasps that made it an extension of his armor.

Once the bag was securely fastened, Jason reached down and retrieved his MA5C, choosing the Assault Rifle over the SMG due to the higher level of firepower that it offered. He firmly affixed it to his back and attached its safety strap before he picked up his Shotgun and attached its strap as well. Only then did he reach upward and grasp the chain that would turn on the dim light, switching off his night vision as soon as he had grasped it.

As he pulled the chain, he heard another creak, this time just outside his door. Already, he was glad that he had decided to get back up after the first creak, and not after this one. His HUD was showing six tightly packed red dots on the other side of the door. If he were just getting up now, it would have been too late. He knew that some of the light from the bulb in the ceiling was shining underneath the door, but that didn't matter anymore. They had known that he was there as soon as they had set foot inside the building.

Jackals were ruthless killers. Once they overlapped their shields, they became a nearly unstoppable force to a regular marine, and a fairly challenging group of opponents to a well armed and rested Orbital Drop Shock Trooper like himself. Unfortunately, Jason was only decently armed, and severely lacking in sleep. Fortunately for him, he had plenty of experience in dealing with Jackals in the field, and knew that they didn't switch on their shields until they could actually see a threat, because the shields could only run for a short time before having to be switched off to regenerate lost power. And at night, the light given off by the plasma barrier played hell with the night vision of everyone that could see it.

Smiths quickly made up his mind and swapped weapons, affixing his Shotgun to his back and retrieving his Assault Rifle, ensuring that there was a round in the chamber checking to make sure that all the gun's stats matched what was displayed on his visor.

Jason crossed the room so that he was directly across from the door, noting that his mission camera was still rolling, and would be for several more weeks until it ran out of allotted storage space. He raised his Rifle, pointing it at the center of the door, roughly at a Jackal's chest height.

"One, Two, Three, Four..."He stopped counting out loud, his helmet recognizing the voice command and bringing up a small stopwatch in the corner of his helmets screen.

The bastards were grouped up and approaching the door slowly; even better, the distinctive shimmer that indicated a plasma shield was turned on wasn't present on his radar. _Thank god for new tech, _Smiths thought as he watched the blobs on the radar get closer and closer together and knowing that he only had one chance to do this right.

_Twenty Eight, Twenty Nine, Thirty... _Jason Smiths squeezed the trigger and fanned his gun across the door, making sure to spray a wide enough area so as to hit all six of the targets evenly. Exactly three seconds later, the last 7.62 x 51 mm Full Metal Jacket Armor Piercing round in the magazine exited the barrel, succeeded in tearing off what was left of the top half of the door, and flattened harmlessly against the nearly undetectable energy shield of one of the six Special Operations Elites standing in the hallway outside Jason's room.

Jason had had a great deal of training when it came to the Sangheili warrior caste system, and so upon seeing his true targets, promptly calculated the positives and negatives of his situation.

The Elite in the forefront of the group held a plasma rifle, as did the two flanking him on either side. The one directly behind the leader held a plasma carbine and had a beam rifle strapped to his back. The other two held what looked like heavier versions of the plasma pistol, likely designed to be used in nearly any combat situation, and both had Fuel Rod Cannons on their backs. All six carried unlit plasma swords on their hips, ready to be pulled and cut him in half at a seconds notice.

_I could swap weapons, I might even be able to kill two or three of these bastards if I sidestep and use the Shotgun point blank. _This was sounding more and more like a good idea to him, but for some reason, he still felt unsure about his plan. _Probably because it's suicide, and that's not what I signed up for when I enlisted._

Jason Smiths made up his mind. He pivoted on the balls of his feet, turning to the window. At the same time, he dropped his Assault Rifle, letting the strap do its job and halt his gun's fall before it hit the ground. As he began to sprint for the three foot by four foot window, Jason pulled his Pistol out, taking aim at the reinforced window and hoping that the non-standard Semi-Armor Piercing Explosive rounds would be able to shatter the inch thick glass before he got there.

It took him a total of two seconds to reach the window, by which time Jason was able to fire seven rounds from his pistol. This had the desired effect of completely shattering the supposedly shatterproof window and allowing him to jump out of it just as the six Special Operations Sangheili were entering the room and turning towards him.

As he fell, Jason tried to aim for a burned out car that he hoped would break his fall. He hit it and rolled off, thankful that the metal hood had crumpled and absorbed some of the energy. He heard yelling from above him, but he didn't look up.

The Elites had made it to the window. _They probably let the sniper go first so he could shoot me if I survived the landing. _This thought got Jason up from where he had been bent over on his hands and knees and encouraged him to start running.

As Jason sprinted towards an alleyway across the street, bright green bolts of plasma started to rain down around him, solidifying his theory that the sniper would be allowed to get to the window first. Several of them hit, almost completely draining his shields before he was halfway to the alley. The shots stopped, and Jason made the assumption that the Elite standing in the widow was reloading, which would give him the time he needed to get to the alleyway and escape them for a few minutes or so.

He was wrong. Half a step before he reached the safety of the alley, a bright blue beam of plasma impacted Jason Smiths' left shoulder. It smashed its way through the rest of his shields and punched a neat half inch wide hole through his armor, muscle, bone, muscle, and finally armor again before melting a hole in the concrete to Jason's left, having cauterized everything that it touched in his shoulder.

Jason screamed and fell, clutching his shoulder as he tumbled into the safety of the alley, crawling roughly twenty feet in to ensure that he could no longer be seen. As he lay out of the sniper's line of fire, Jason tried to figure out what to do. _I can't stay here… but it's kinda nice here… it's dark and I'm tired. I could just sleep_. Jason started drifting off, the wound in his shoulder hurting less and less with each passing second that he laid there.

Jason heard six loud thumps from back in the direction of the room that he had resided in for a few hours. _That was probably the Elites jumping down from the window. They're probably hunting me, trying to kill all the rest of the people that'll oppose them; so basically everyone. _But Jason Smiths found that he was caring less and less about them as he drifted off.

As Jason slowly closed his eyes he could see the six Elites round the corner and move towards him. He didn't care, they were twenty feet away, and he would be asleep by the time they reached him. They closed to fifteen feet.

Two giant figures emerged from the shadows immediately to his right. As the one in the lead stepped over his outstretched legs, he saw what they were. Both Spartans had MA5C Assault Rifles on their backs and Pistols on their thighs. The one in the lead carried a Sniper Rifle, and Jason's muddled and distracted brain told him that it looked familiar. He leveled it at the Six Elites, who roared and angled towards these new, worthier opponents.

The two Spartans were tagged in Jason's HUD. The one with the Sniper was labeled as S-005; the one behind him was S-137. The latter crouched over Jason, shielding him from a stray plasma bolt that had been directed at S-005. The Spartan squatting above him pulled a stim form one of its armor's compartments, injecting it into Jason's thigh.

Almost immediately, Jason felt himself becoming more alert. His vision was restored just in time to watch all six Elites open fire on S-005. Jason could see the shimmer as the Spartan's shields absorbed and dissipated as much of the plasma as they could, but they were draining quickly. While the Elites continued to fire, the Spartan's Sniper Rifle cracked four times in rapid succession, the last round exiting the barrel before the shell casing from the first had made it to the ground.

Four shots had been fired, and all four found their mark. Four of the six Elites now lay on the ground, all four missing huge chunks of their heads. But now the Spartan would have to reload, and it was obvious even to Jason that he wasn't going to make it. The Elites had completely drained S-005's shields, and the only thing that had saved him was that the two remaining elites had had to let their weapons cool down.

The Spartan crouching over Jason was spraying bio-foam in his wound, but he wasn't paying attention. He watched as the lead Spartan dropped his rifle and pulled an unnecessarily large looking knife from its sheath. He lunged with amazing speed, jumping clean over both of the Elite's heads and twisting so that he landed on his feet behind them, facing Jason.

The Spartan grasped the neck of the closest Elite and pulled him backwards, forcing his knife deep into his back, right where the shield didn't cover. The blade protruded out the front of the Elite, dripping with purple blood. The Special Operations Trooper died instantly, the Spartan's knife having pierced several vital internal organs.

By then, the last Elite left standing had turned towards where his comrade was skewered on the Spartan's knife and raised his weapon.

S-005 wasn't going to make it. The Elite's weapon was raised and the Spartan's only unoccupied weapon was on his back. But to reach it, he would have to drop the Elite he as using as a shield. He hesitated.

The Elite started firing, pouring as many plasma rounds down range as he could. S-005 ducked behind the Elite's corpse, but the plasma was beginning to burn its way through.

Jason's Rifle was cradled in his lap, fully loaded and angled towards S-005 and the Elite. He steadied the weapon, making sure that the targeting reticule on his HUD was lined up with the middle of the Elite's back.

Jason squeezed the trigger, taking pride in his ability to hold the gun steady and ensure that nearly all of the 7.62 x 51 mm rounds found their way into the Elite's back, killing him before his plasma burned all the way through his dead ally. The Spartan withdrew his knife from the Elite's back and wiped it off on its armor before approaching Jason and S-137. Both registered as Petty Officer 2nd Class on his HUD, meaning that in a combat situation such as this one, they far outranked him.

Jason attempted to raise his right hand in a salute, but couldn't raise it high enough.

"On your feet soldier, we'll get you somewhere you can rest." S-005 said. "We're going to need all the help we can get."

Jason struggled to his feet with the help of the two juggernaughts, both gently pulling him to his feet before helping him work his way back towards the entrance to the alley.

They ruled out his old building almost immediately, since it had already been visited once, and likely would be again when the team didn't report in.

"They're working their way from North to South." S-005 said. "We're better off finding a building towards the North that they've already swept."

They found one such building within two miles and they deemed it a good place to rest up. S-137 quickly swept the small building for Covenant troops and, upon finding it empty, found a room with a bed. That's where they took Jason, laying him down on the bed to rest after they reapplied bio-foam and a bandage.

Jason didn't even try to refuse; he just removed the necessary armor components to make sure he didn't aggravate his wound, and slept.

He awoke roughly twelve hours later with a stabbing pain in his left shoulder. He was alone, the two Spartans that he vaguely remembered from the night before were nowhere to be seen.

As he stood up and looked around, Jason heard the sound of a bolt being cycled from down the hall. Relieved that he wasn't alone, Jason donned his helmet and as much of his armor as he could, and retrieved his weapons from where they were neatly laid out on the floor before setting off down the hallway on search of whomever made the noise he had heard.

He was still painfully aware of the hole in his shoulder, but tried not to let it slow him down too much as he swept through the small apartment. It didn't take Jason long to find the two Spartans. They had set up shop in the living room, laying out all of their various armaments in neat rows on the floor. As Jason approached his two companions, he started noticing things that he had missed the night before.

Firstly, Jason could tell which Spartan was which almost immediately. The Spartan that had done all the fighting the night before looked like he was in bad shape. Jason knew that the Spartan was male, because both Spartans had managed to take off all of their armor and laid it out on the floor. His armor was badly scratched and covered in what looked like plasma scoring.

The other Spartan was a female, and her armor looked far less damaged, though it appeared as if she was making repairs as well. She was tall. _But then again, _he thought, _they all are, it gives them an advantage in almost any fight_. She was attractive too, her short black hair was in sharp contrast to her almost unnaturally pale skin, but also drew his attention to her amazingly blue eyes. Amazing blue eyes that he now realized were staring at him.

Jason quickly looked away, fearing that she could somehow see through his black reflective visor and would know what he was thinking. So instead of looking over at her again, he studied the other Spartan. He had short brown hair, brown eyes, very pale skin, and was also unusually tall. It was only now that Jason noticed that both Spartan's rank and ID were displayed when he looked at them, and remembered that they both thoroughly outranked him.

He snapped to attention and saluted.

"At ease soldier," S-005 said. Jason relaxed, dropping his hand to his side and approaching the two Spartans.

"Orders sir?" Jason asked, hoping that it wasn't anything too strenuous because of the state his shoulder was in.

"For now, check your armor and see what repairs you can make, then clean your weapons. How's your shoulder feeling?"

Jason almost told them that it was fine so they weren't concerned, but that could prove dangerous if they thought he was fine in a fight. He could get them all killed if he lied.

"It hurts sir. I'm not at full fighting capacity."

"Good, I would have been worried if you said you were fine. That would make you a liar and a liability. Get to work on your weapons and armor, work as fast as you can, but be thorough."

"Yes sir." Jason said, unloading his weapons and laying them out on the floor.

Once Jason's weapons were laid out, he disassembled his armor and began making minor repairs, mostly consisting of tightening straps and locking plates in place. They sat there in silence as they cleaned their weapons and armor. At one point, Jason changed the bandages on his shoulder. The verbal silence was deafening, and after ten minutes, Jason felt like he had to speak up.

"We're going to be stuck together in this city for a while," he said. "We might as well learn each other's names."

"That's a fair point," S-137 said, she looked as S-005 and he nodded. She turned back to Jason. "I'm Carris."

"James," said the other Spartan.

"I'm Jason," he said. "So what's our plan?"

"The city is lost," Carris said. "But there's something here, something the Covenant wants."

"How do you know?" Jason asked.

"Because we're still alive," James said bitterly. "If there wasn't something here then the Covenant would have glassed the city a long time ago."

""Well what is it?" Jason asked.

"No idea," Carris said, "But that's our new mission. We have to stop the Covenant from claiming it as theirs. Comms are blocked, so we're on our own for now."

"How long do we have?"

"From the Covenant chatter that I've heard, they've already found it, and it's big. We have a week at most before they're able to take it and go." James said.

"Then we had better get to work," Jason said, grimly returning to the task of cleaning his shotgun. As he worked, he thought about what had happened to lead him to this twisted turn of events.


	2. Chapter 2

_Okay guys, i decided to split up chapter two into chapter two and chapter three since it was over twice as long as chapter one. so, here's chapter two, enjoy and review please!_

**Chapter 2**

**D + 00:03:37 (Sergeant Major Wyatt Mission Clock) / SOEIV, in combat drop to surface of Reach**

"One minute until impact." Sergeant Major Ainsley Wyatt said. As per protocol, he had been the first to launch. That way, when the rest of them landed, there would already be a commander to give orders.

Someone popped a disk into a slot in their pod and the ODST anthem began playing over the loudspeakers in all two hundred pods in the Company. The unauthorized usage of UNSC Comms systems during battle was strictly frowned upon. This, however, was routine for the Helljumpers, and it would have felt weird to not hear it playing as they made their dangerous descent to the warring planet below.

"Forty five seconds out," Wyatt said. He knew that his thrusters should be activating soon so that he could slow his descent. Otherwise he'd hit the ground at terminal velocity and his pod would dig itself into the ground. The rigid Titanium-A frame would keep the pod in one piece, but Ainsley would be killed instantly and painlessly on impact. If that happened, command would fall to the next highest ranked ODST that was dropping down with them.

_I suppose the operation wouldn't be a complete disaster, but the company would lose a lot of sensitive equipment, the AI, and their most senior ranked commander._

Still, it wasn't something that required his attention at the moment; only something to ponder occasionally, his pod still hadn't reached the stage that the thrusters should deploy at. He checked the clock again, seeing that there were still forty seconds left until impact and deployment, an eternity in drop time.

"How long until thruster deployment?" Ainsley Wyatt asked Wilhelm, the Company's AI that he has worked with on countless combat drops such as this one.

"Sir," Wilhelm replied. He spoke slowly and carefully, obviously not wanting to rush what he had to say. Despite being an AI, he sounded scared. "It appears as if the pod has stopped responding. There will be no thruster deployment. It has been a pleasure serving with you over the last three years." Wyatt was quiet for several seconds after this announcement.

"You too Wilhelm," Wyatt whispered slowly when he had regained the ability to speak.

Wyatt's timer said thirty three seconds until impact, but time had begun to slow for him.

"Thirty seconds," Wyatt said over the Company's Comms. His voiced was hushed. "My pod has decided that it's not going to work for me. It's been a pleasure serving with you."

Silence echoed through his pod. The anthem continued to play, but Wyatt ceased to hear it. The sounds of his pod rushing through Reach's atmosphere faded away from his attention, leaving him in silence.

"Sir, it's been a pleasure to serve with you," said one of the ODSTs in Wyatt's company. As soon as he finished speaking, the rest of the Helljumpers riding down with him began echoing heartfelt variants of this message.

Ainsley Wyatt knew that most men started screaming now, but that wasn't how he wanted to die. _I'm gonna die on my own damn terms. _He couldn't imagine it any other way.

He quickly pulled three heavy stims from a pouch on his thigh and injected them, causing instant euphoria. He then drew his pistol, pressing the muzzle to the bottom of his chin. His finger tightened on the trigger as he prepared to end his own life. But he never got the chance to. His pod smashed onto the street below, digging itself into the asphalt and ending the Sergeant Major's life before he could do it himself. Thankfully he was never aware of this, and died happily believing that he was going out on his own terms.

Jason Smiths pod was towards the middle of the pack, but with the assistance of the camera on the bottom of his Single Occupant Exoatmospheric Insertion Vehicle, and the monitor in front of him, he could see his commander's pod as it impacted into the ground.

His thrusters had activated, and his descent was slowed significantly, allowing him to hit the ground much less violently.

When Jason's pod landed, the front hatch slid up and over the top of the pod just like it was supposed to, and Jason wasted no time in unstrapping and grabbing his weapons. He slung his SRS99D-S2 AM Sniper Rifle on his back and grasped his Silenced SMG, making sure that he had as many magazines for both as he could carry.

"Smiths," Master Sergeant Spalding shouted at him.

"Yes sir," Jason replied, snapping to attention.

"I want you and Cohen on top of that three story building at the end of the street," he said, gesturing towards where the road dead-ended into an intersecting road.

"Roger Sir!" Jason said, saluting before placing his weapons back in the SOEIV and strapping himself back in. Once he was strapped in he pressed the hatch release, causing the front hatch to slide back down. He used the thrusters and the extra tank of fuel to guide himself back into the air and on top of the building he had been assigned to. His spotter, Cohen, landed a few seconds after he did.

Jason Smiths' 'spotter' was the same rank as he was, but it was understood that Jason was the one that took the lead. They'd been friends since their first days at the academy. They'd served together for years, even before they were accepted by the ODSTs.

Usually, the better shooter served as the spotter, due to the increased level of experience required for the task. But as Jason and his 'spotter', Alexander Cohen, were equals when it came to shooting, Jason had suggested early on that they swap out every now and then so that they were both just as good at spotting as they were at shooting.

"Who's spotting today?" Alex asked as he sauntered over to Jason, Rifle in hand.

"No one," Jason said. "This is going to be a target heavy operation. We're both shooting."

"Yes Sir!" Alex said jokingly. They often made fun of the fact that neither of them could ever manage to outrank the other.

"Just make sure to call out your targets so neither of us wastes a round!" Jason said as he slung his SMG on his back and grabbed extra boxes of ammunition for his Sniper Rifle.

The two friends took up positions next to each other on the rooftop, leaving about five feet of space between them to allow for a wider range of motion.

"Snipers in position sir!" Jason told Spalding through the Company's Comm frequency.

"Good! All right boys, the Covenant are two streets away, that gives us about five minutes to dig in and get ready. I want mines scattered on the streets and any open ground between us and them."

The ODSTs had done this countless times before, and didn't need any further instruction. They knew that they needed to get off the street as soon as possible. The covenant would likely have Wraiths and Ghosts; vehicles that were nearly impossible to take down when you were exposed on the street.

It took three minutes to lay out over one hundred LOTUS Anti-Tank and various Anti-Personnel mines on the street in the direction that the Covenant would be coming from. After that, the company dug in and waited.

The Covenant took longer than they had anticipated to arrive, but when they did they came in force. The first to arrive were the Grunts. Individually, they were nothing more than an annoyance, but the seventy five grunts that came running down the street provided a very serious threat. They also foreshadowed the battle that was to come.

"Don't waste your shots on Grunts unless you need to pick one off that's posing a serious threat. We don't want to give ourselves away too quickly." Jason said.

Just as he said that, a Grunt started sprinting towards where Sergeant Spalding was crouched down behind an abandoned car. The Grunt held a lit plasma grenade in each hand and Jason knew from personal experience that he was more than likely screaming as well. He saw that Sergeant Spalding hadn't seen this new threat, and knew that he had to act quickly to save what little command structure was left.

His scope and helmet told him that the Grunt was 40 meters away and that there was a stiff wind rolling up the street between where he was and where a Grunt was making the last attack of his life. He adjusted his aim accordingly and gently squeezed the trigger.

The 12.7 mm round caused the Grunt's head to explode, and completely severed the line to his methane tank. The grenades dropped to the ground where they stuck, causing their timers to begin counting down from three. When the two grenades detonated, the heat ignited the methane leaking out of the dead Grunt's broken methane pack. The resulting explosion killed three grunts, on top of an additional four that had been killed during the detonation of the grenades.

"Good shot," Alex remarked, "They know where we are."

"The shot was justified. They would have killed him."

"True. Think we should change locations?"

"No. Any Grunts that were able to tell where the shot came from died in the explosion."

"Good point. Looks like the Jackals are starting to show up. And where there are Jackals, there are inevitably snipers."

"Yeah," Jason said, "Keep your eyes out for anything posing a threat to us. I'll keep watch over the rest of the Company."

"Got it," Alex replied, shifting side to side to settle down further on the rooftop. "I'd say we have about three more shots before they figure out where we are."

"Then we had better make 'em count."

They both knew that as soon as the Covenant figured out where they were, it would be an all out battle for survival as every Covenant soldier down there tried to kill them as fast as possible. No one likes an enemy sniper; they're the most hated people on the battlefield.

They watched the battle rage below them between the Company of Helljumpers, the Jackals, and the very few grunts that had managed to keep themselves alive this long. For the most part, the ODSTs were winning. There were a few casualties here and there, but they were mostly due to the occasional plasma grenade that was thrown well enough to kill one of the very spread out Helljumpers.

When the Jackals had begun to pour out in the street, there were easily over a hundred of them. Now, there were still over seventy five, and it had been nearly twenty minutes of exchanging fire with them.

"Ordinance," Sergeant Spalding called out through the Company channel. "Arm Anti-Personnel mines one through twenty five."

When the street had been mined, the Explosive Ordinance squad had laid out twenty five LOTUS Anti-Tank mines and seventy five Anti-Personnel mines. They had left them all disarmed to avoid wasting them on Grunts like the Covenant higher-ups had intended for them to do.

Now, however, they armed a third of the seventy five Anti-Personnel mines that littered the battleground below. The street had been swarming with Jackals and littered with dead Grunts before the mines had detonated. Their shields had been used with scary efficiency, preventing the majority of the Helljumpers' shots from reaching their intended targets.

The twenty five mines that were armed were scattered evenly across what had previously been a highway with eight lanes of traffic before the invasion. When the mines were activated, they were all triggered nearly instantly. Each mine was made up of a proximity sensor, a blasting cap, a high explosive, and an outer shell that was designed to fracture into thousands of tiny pieces and get thrown upward and outward at several thousand kilometers an hour.

The shrapnel filled the air, shredding through the thick skin of the Jackals like a hot steak knife through butter. The dark purple blood of the Jackals and the bright blue blood of the dead grunts that littered the street filled the air in a slightly gross yet satisfying mist that was blown around in the slow wind drifting up the street, coating everything in sight. The beautiful purple and blue coating completely masked the horrors of the battlefield.

Silence descended over the street. Nothing moved, nothing twitched, and no one spoke. The street level ODSTs reloaded in near silence, the only noise was the sound of fresh magazines being quietly slid into weapons, no one wanting to disturb the blissful quiet.

"That," Alex whispered over the Company's open Comm channel, "Was beautiful."

The channel erupted into laughter as the post-battle adrenaline wore off, leaving them all giddy and calm. They laughed about it now, but if Jason didn't know that it was the bodies of a couple hundred Covenant soldiers that had created the appearance of this royal purple and neon blue highway, he would, without a doubt, have said that it was beautiful.

"Alright men, move out." Sergeant Spalding said, "Ordinance, recover the mines and distribute them. We'll want to keep as many as we can. Everybody refill your ammo in your pods. We're taking this city back street by street."

"Hell yeah!" several of the men on the ground yelled.

"It's about damn time we took this fight to the Covenant," Jason quietly remarked, receiving another wave of cheers.

The Helljumpers began stepping out on the street. The boys in Ordinance were collecting the remaining mines and passing them out. Within five minutes, the company was divided up into five platoons on the street and was preparing to push for the heart of the city.

Jason got up and started jogging back to his pod. The rooftop was large, and he wanted to make sure he had all the ammo that he could carry. Alex hadn't fired a shot yet, so he wouldn't need to go back for ammunition. He had left Alex there knowing that he would be watching over the Company while they readied themselves for deployment.

Jason Smiths reached his pod, roughly 100 meters from the edge of the rooftop. He retrieved what he needed and turned around to face Alex again, beginning the short jog back to the edge.

Alex saw them first, yelling out a warning to the Company. Who knew how long they had been there, waiting for the Helljumpers to let down their guard. They should have shown up on the motion sensors, but they weren't moving. Jason was amazed that Alex had even seen them, Jason switched to Alex's helmet cam and saw that they were covered in the same purple and blue war paint that everything else was.

"Wraiths!" Alex screamed again over the open Comm channel. He began to fire, the booming of his Sniper Rifle echoing up and down the street.

The wraiths fired back.

Jason wasn't even halfway to Alex yet, but he watched as at least a dozen Plasma Mortars sailed high into the air in perfect arcs. Though they were all going to different places, they all seemed to originate from a fairly central location.

Alex kept reloading and pumping rounds into the enemy tanks as fast as he could. Jason kept running towards him. It was still too early to be able to tell where the mortars were going to go, and Jason could only hope that the rest of the Company was taking cover and preparing for another firefight; this one short, but more intense than any that he could remember.

Jason made it to the edge of the roof and laid back down, propping up his rifle on the ledge and looking through the scope. What he saw scared him more than anything he had ever seen before.

Alex's helmet had only shown four wraiths, but now Jason saw that over a dozen lined the street, all heavily coated in purple and blue blood. Alex had already managed to disable three of the alien tanks, but Jason knew that they took a full magazine to stop, and that was only if you were a good enough shot to his the main operator.

When the Wraiths fired their first salvo of Plasma Mortars, the Helljumpers were still congregated on the street where the majority of the fighting had occurred. There were over a dozen men carrying M41 Rocket Launchers in the crowd, but there were too many people between them and the Wraiths for them to have a clear shot.

The first salvo caught the company out in the open. When the plasma struck, many of the mines that the Helljumpers had been carrying were detonated, shredding dozens of soldiers. Dozens more were vaporized instantly, others suffered horrible burns and wounds and died quickly, and the rest only suffered minor burns or instant amputations and tried to fight as best they could. Alex and Jason were the only two uninjured men in the whole Company, and they were the two inflicting the most damage to the giant alien vehicles.

Jason and Alex were pumping round after round downrange, destroying a wraith roughly every four shots. They had disabled seven so far, but there were still eight left, and soon they would figure out that the two snipers were the biggest threat that they faced.

The seven remaining Wraiths fired two more salvos in rapid succession, both still aimed at the street level survivors. They completely wiped them out, leaving only Alex and Jason alive out of the five platoons of highly trained soldiers that they had dropped down with. Below them laid a solid glass field composed of some of the best soldiers that the UNSC had to offer.

When the second to last wave of plasma had struck, the rest of the undetonated mines had been set off, shredding everything on the battleground into confetti sized chunks and making it that that much easier for the final salvo of Plasma Mortars to turn everything to glass.

"Jesus," Alex whispered from beside him. Both of their rifles were empty and required reloading, but neither of them did, instead lying there in shock and fear.

"We have to leave. Now," Jason said, making sure that a sense of urgency was clear in his voice.

"No, we should finish the job, kill every last one of the Covenant bastards that did this to our friends!" Alex protested, clearly wanting to do anything but leave. Jason remembered something that had been said to him years ago, but that he never believed that he would repeat until now.

"Run, run, run away; live to fight another day."

"What?" Alex asked, obviously confused. "How the hell can you say that? Those were our friends out there!"

The wraiths had stopped firing when the last of the ground based resistance had been killed, but now they seemed to remember that Alex and Jason were still there, and still posed a huge threat to them. There were only seven of the Covenant tanks left, but they fired one last salvo into the air; a salvo that was most definitely going to reduce Alex and Jason to a smooth spot of glass on the rooftop. Alex reloaded and started firing, taking out three more of the Wraiths in a matter of seconds.

"Get up and run you idiot!" Jason yelled. He sprang to his feet, holding his rifle in his hand. He grabbed Alex by the arm and dragged him to his feet. Both of them kept solid holds on their rifles, taking them with them along with the full stocks of ammunition that were still stored in their armor. They ran towards their pods, stopping when they reached then so that Jason could grab his M90 CAWS 8 Gauge Shotgun and two boxes of shells from his pod, swapping his Rifle for the Shotgun.

"Keep your Rifle, we may need it, but I foresee a lot of close quarters combat in our future." Jason said.

"Why did we run?!" Alex snapped at Jason. He had never used that tone with Jason before and it shocked him. His best friend had never been this angry at him in all the years that they had known each other.

"So we wouldn't be killed," Jason replied.

"We should have stayed and destroyed the Wraiths that killed the rest of our company!"

"Then go back and finish them off, but it's suicidal!" Jason retorted angrily. Alex turned on his heel and jogged back to the edge of the rooftop where they had been laying only moments before.

"They're gone." He whispered. His tone was a mixture of hurt and rage, as it he couldn't believe that Jason had saved his life.

"Good," Jason said, "If they think we're dead then they won't be looking for us. We'll have the element of surprise in any plan that we make."

Alex didn't say anything, he just walked back towards Jason, passing him and continuing on to the next rooftop.

"Where are you going?" Jason asked, "We need to stick together. We have to watch each other's backs!"

"I'm going to find and kill the four Elites that were driving those Wraiths. Don't follow me unless you're willing to help."

"That's suicide! Come back!" Jason yelled after him. Alex kept walking.

Jason watched his best friend walk away, leaving him by himself in the huge hostile city. He stood there for five minutes, thinking about what his next move should be. _I should find somewhere to stay the night. Wherever I find can act as a home base too. I'll need somewhere to fall back to._ He checked the status of his Comms. The short range was fully operational, but the long range channel was blocked, most likely jammed by the Covenant.

He made up his mind, deciding on a mission to keep him motivated. _I have to find and disable that jammer and radio in for extraction or reinforcements. _

He walked to the edge of the rooftop that overlooked the street, leaving his rifle in his drop pod. He had made numerous modifications to his Rifle to make it function as smoothly as it could. He had added a flash suppressing barrel with more rifling for increased accuracy. His scope had three settings instead of the standard two, in addition to the 4x and 8x zoom, he added a 16x zoom that greatly increased his effective range. His rifle had a stock that was hugely adjustable and was fitted for him, though that could be easily adjusted in the field as necessary.

As Jason attached a rope to the edge of the rooftop, he thought about going back for his rifle, but decided against it. The Shotgun and SMG would serve him better in the close to medium range combat of a city. He quickly rappelled down the building, landing with a thud on the slippery glass street that had once been his fellow ODSTs. The glass was mostly black with small patches of purple and blue, showing him what had once been a Helljumper and what was just melted street.

Jason walked to the middle of the deserted battleground and squatted down besides the darkest patch of glass on the whole street. This was where his fellow soldiers and friends had been the most densely grouped. He pulled his Titanium-A Combat Knife from its sheath and looked it over, ensuring that it would do what he needed it to. He then pulled his M6C SOCOM Pistol from its holster on his thigh and fired seven tightly grouped Semi-Armor Piercing Non-Explosive rounds into the glass at his feet before re-holstering it and raising his knife.

He plunged the knife downward, digging it into the ground up to the hilt. The wide blade forced the glass apart, causing it to crack and pop up around him. There were several decent sized chunks, and he took three that were just smaller than the palm of his hand, storing them deep in his pack.

Jason Smiths stood up, looking at the destroyed city around him. He slowly walked onwards towards where his Company had intended to go, leaving his knife in the ground. It would serve as a headstone, a reminder, and a semi-permanent tribute to the brave men and women that had fallen here today.


	3. Chapter 3

_Gah, okay guys, sorry this chapter took so long to upload. I took a break from writing over thanksgiving break and once i picked up again I temporarily lost the willpower to type out what I wrote. Hopefully I'll have the next chapter uploaded a lot sooner. Thanks for reading!_

**Chapter 3**

**D + 00:03:37 (ODST Alexander Cohen Mission Clock) / Unknown Street, surface of Reach**

Alexander Cohen took a mental note of his surroundings, making sure that he would remember exactly where he was when he finally made a stand. He carried only his rifle and eight 12.7x114 mm APFSDS rounds, his combat knife, and four frag grenades. He knew that he might not make it back to where he had stashed the rest of his gear, but he didn't care.

Fifteen years ago, the Covenant had glassed Alex's home world, with his family still on it. No matter how many Covenant bastards Alex killed, he still couldn't find a sense of peace, because he was always running. He had been visiting relatives on another planet when it had happened, and not one day went by that he didn't wish he had been there with his parents and little brother. He had been nothing more than a ticking time bomb for years now, waiting for the day that he would snap.

It took the death of his Company, all of his remaining friends and fellow soldiers that kept him sane on a daily basis, to finally drive him over the edge. Alexander Cohen had officially snapped, and nothing was going to keep him from killing anyone, or anything, that got in the way of his sole goal in life; the death of the remaining four Wraith operators.

He knew that the four Wraiths were heading his way, and that they traveled alone. He had less than a minute before they turned the corner in front of him and came his way. They were on patrol, and he had watched them pass by twice. They were still covered in the beautiful purple and blue blood, like everything had been before they had killed his friends.

The Wraiths turned the corner. Alex waited until they were ten meters away, and then stepped out onto the street, blocking their path. He turned on his external loudspeakers, directly addressing the operator of the first Covenant Tank.

"Come out here you bastards!" He yelled, "Come out here and fight, unless you're too afraid that you'll lose."

He wasn't sure if they knew what he had said. Only some elites carried translation software with them. To emphasize his point, he threw his sniper rifle to the side and stood defiantly. He watched as the Tank column ground to a halt in front of him.

Alex smiled behind his helmet's faceplate, now positive that they would accept his challenge. He watched as the elite in the first tank got out, then turned behind him and barked an order to his comrades. They too got out, all three walked up to the one in the front, two on his right (Alex's left), and one on his left (Alex's right). The first one to get out had been a Sangheili Ultra, and the other three were Sangheili Majors. All were very highly ranked Covenant troops.

"Are you ready to die?" he asked with a smile. He knew that the smile could be heard in his voice, even though they couldn't see it.

"Are you?" the Elite asked in response. This shocked Alex. So few of the Covenant warriors were this fluent in English, it was rare to run into one. His voice was gravelly and difficult to understand, but he was definitely understandable.

Alex chinned a switch in his helmet, turning off his experimental energy shield. He knew that the Elites could see it shimmer and then go out. Alex watched as the Elites disabled their protective energy shields, making themselves far more vulnerable to his attacks than they had been before.

Alex gestured towards his discarded Sniper Rifle, clearly indicating that he didn't wish for firearms to play a part in this fight. The Elites looked over at the Rifle, staring at it for roughly thirty seconds before looking back at him.

"You wish us to throw our weapons away? Do you seek to trick us?"

"No, I want to fight you without the aid of our conventional weapons." Alex said, he reached up and slowly removed his helmet, tossing it to the side. He watched it as it fell, the helmet winding up facing them with camera poised to capture everything. Alex grabbed his grenade pouch and gingerly tossed it to the side as well.

The Elite in front of Alex contorted his mouth in what Alex could only assume was a smile. The Elite obviously had a basic understanding of what Alex had in mind, and no problems with it. The Elite tossed his plasma rifle to the side and gestured for the others to do the same.

Once they had followed suit, the Elite reached up and slowly removed his helmet, setting it on the ground with far more reverence than Alex had treated his with. When the other three Elites did the same, Alex smiled.

He drew his large Combat Knife from its sheath on his chest and took up a fighting stance, facing the Elite in front of him. The Elite took up a stance that Alex had seen many times before.

It was indicative of the Elite waiting. He was over confident, he thought he could win no matter what, and he wanted Alex to make the first move. Alex was more confident though. He was armed, and they weren't. That gave him an almost infinite advantage.

However, as he watched, a nine inch long pointed blade of plasma emerged from the backs of all four Elites' armored hands. It was affixed there, and Alex could only assume that it was designed for assassinations.

Alexander Cohen now knew one thing for sure. He was going to die here today. But there was no way he was going down without a fight.

As Rama' Randjamee activated his Energy Daggers, he saw the fear in his challenger's face. The human was scared, but this was only natural. Rama' Randjamee had killed many enemies to achieve the rank of Sangheili Ultra. However, the human's expression quickly changed to one less frequently seen, but not unknown to Rama'; resolve.

"Ah, so you have not given up yet." Rama' said. "This is good. It shall make your death far more enjoyable."

The human said nothing, only adjusting his position so that his knife was raised and directed at Rama'.

"You killed all of my friends, and my fellow soldiers." The human said, "For that, you die today." As soon as he finished speaking, he turned, raised his knife, and threw it, lodging it deep in the head of the Elite furthest to his right and the furthest from Rama'.

As soon as his knife left his hand, the human started moving towards the now dead Elite. It took him two steps to get there, and when he did, Rama' was surprised to watch the human pull the knife out with ease and attack the Sangheili Major immediately to his left; sprinting past Rama' Randjamee to do so.

The human managed to dispatch him quickly, and then sprinted past Rama' once again to engage the last remaining Major. He killed him by cutting his throat, causing him to quickly bleed out and making the major unable to raise his Energy Daggers high enough to inflict more than a minor wound to the human's side.

The human issued a quiet cry of pain, but pressed on, scooping up the grenade pouch just as Rama' reached him. The human spun around to find the Sangheili Ultra right in front of him.

Rama' Randjamee thrust both of his Energy Daggers forward into the human's stomach, lifting him up into the air. The measly human dropped the grenade pouch, unable to maintain his grip due to the pain that he was in.

"Now you die human!" Rama' growled, pulling him closer to his face. Rama' expected to see fear, sadness, perhaps anger on the human's face; but not the satisfied smirk that he saw instead.

"I win." The human whispered, blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth. Rama' heard a short but very distinctive beep from the direction of the human's right hand. He had heard this noise many times, and knew what it was without having to see it.

Rama' Randjamee tried to break away. He tried to drop the human and run, but the human wouldn't let him.

Alexander Cohen reached out and grabbed the back of the Elite's head with his left hand, pulling his right hand back. The Elite roared and tried to push Alex away, but he held on, desperately fighting to maintain his grip on the back of the Elite's head.

Alex shoved his right hand into the roaring mouth of the Elite, jamming the Frag Grenade halfway down the bastard's throat. Alex let go, allowing the Elite to push him away. Alex landed on his back, watching the Elite try and pull the grenade from his mouth for half a second before he covered his exposed head and face with his arms. The Fragmentation Grenade exploded.

A heavy coating of blood and chunks of the Elite's upper body coated his face and body. Alex reached up, wiping the nasty mess off of his face as best he could.

The effects of the grenade had been dampened buy the Elite's body, leaving Alex relatively unscathed apart from the two large gashes in his stomach that were quickly killing him. He quickly grabbed the grenade pouch once again. Once he had it, he reached inside and primed one of the three remaining grenades. He left all three inside, and tossed the bag towards the second Wraith in line.

He got lucky. The pouch sailed through the air and sailed through the hatch of the Covenant Tank. The grenade detonated, causing the other two to explode along with it. This caused the Wraith's fuel cells to explode, and due to how close the four Wraiths were parked to each other, the explosion of one triggered the explosion of the other three, and the ultimate destruction of the four Covenant war machines.

Alex could feel himself bleeding out quickly. He knew he didn't have much longer to live, but managed to prop himself up on one elbow to look around at the death and destruction that he had caused. Alex's vision was fading, but he could still see well enough for him to be able to make out the three and a half dead Elites lying on the ground around him and the four gutted tanks off to one side.

Alex quickly lost the strength to continue holding himself up, causing him to roll over onto his back. He could no longer see the bodies of the Elites that had killed his friends, or the burning outlines of the mangled Wraiths, but their image still remained in his head, allowing him to smile for the first time in hours.

Alex stopped feeling pain in his stomach, his wounds no longer registering in his head. He was at peace with himself for the first time in fifteen years. All his worries, all his pain, everything melted away into a blissful emptiness that slowly consumed him until his heartbeat slowed to a crawl, and eventually stopped.

Jason Smiths walked down the street quickly, not wanting to alert any Covenant troops to his presence. He wanted to stay under the radar if he could, as long as the Covenant though all the troops that had dropped into the city were dead, then he would be able to work without having to worry too much about being hunted down.

As Jason walked down the street, he passed a supermarket that looked like it hadn't been raided too badly when the Covenant invaded. It was right next door to a large apartment building, and he considered stopping for the night. _I could stay here for now,. If I can get by on food from the store, then I won't have to use my rations for now. _

Jason quickly entered the store, grabbing a can of fruit, a loaf of bread, and some sandwich meat. As soon as he had what he needed, he left the store and quickly walked over to the apartment building.

He found a small room with a window facing the street on the third floor, and decided to take refuge in it for now. _This room could serve as a useful place to fall back to after destroying the Comms Jammer._He thought. _Until I find it, I could probably find out more about the Covenant presence in the city._

Jason ate quickly. He was tired, and it was getting late. He would need to rest if he was going to strike back against the Covenant starting tomorrow. He slid a heavy desk in front of the door, which would buy him a few extra seconds if something tried to force its way in.

And with the desk at the door and his Shotgun by the bed, Jason Smiths slept.


	4. Chapter 4

_Okay guys, I promised that I would get it uploaded soon, so here you go! Thank you all for reading, please review if you have time to. I greatly appreciate feedback on what I write. Hopefully I'll have the next chapter up in the next couple of weeks, but no promises. I would like to go ahead and warn you that I am introducing a new, Non-Canonical character in the next Chapter. It is going to be a never before mentioned spartan, however, out of the 75 Conscripted spartan IIs, only about forty to fifty have been mentioned, and roughly forty spartan IIs are currently serving Canonically, despite only having 33 make it through the augmentation process. So I don't feel too bad about introducing a new one that'll hang out for a little while..._

**Chapter 4**

**D + 25:46:43 (Jason Smiths Mission Clock) / Unknown Building, Surface of Reach**

Jason Smiths woke up in an unfamiliar room, with sunlight streaming through the window. _How long have I been asleep? _He wondered. He immediately donned his helmet, checking the mission clock and comparing it to Reach's time. It was 11:46.

_Jesus, I need to get up. _He quickly scrambled to his feet. He collected his weapons and prepared to leave the room. Before he left, he stashed many of the contents of his pack in the room for later.

He crouched on a balcony outside the door of the one room apartment, looking down on the street below. He watched Covenant troops come and go, noting their timing and spotting a pattern that would allow him to slip by unnoticed. As he watched, several Phantoms flew over head, all coming from the same direction.

_There must be a base that way, _he speculated. _That's where I'm going I guess. That's probably where the radar jammer is. _He waited for a break in the patrols and made his way street side. He considered trying to make his way across the rooftops, but that would be too risky if a Phantom flew overhead and spotted him.

Jason made his way down the street towards where the Phantoms had been coming from. So far, no patrols had come his way, and that greatly relieved him. If he ran into a patrol then he'd be forced to engage them, and that could force him to give up his element of surprise. Since that was the only thing he had going for him at the moment, he was nervous to lose it.

The streets were deserted, the only things left on them were dead bodies, burnt out cars, and shattered glass. Every now and then, Jason came upon the body of another Helljumper. This told him that others had dropped down as well.

The Helljumper's bodies were inevitably accompanies by a large number of dead Covenant troops. He searched the bodies of his fellow Marines, hoping to find something that would help him live a little longer, but the three that he'd found so far had fought to the last bullet, and two of them looked like they had managed to kill a few with their Combat Knives before they died.

Those two ODSTs reminded Jason of Alex. Alex had loved his knife. He kept it sharper than anyone else that Jason met. Alex saw the knife as a symbol of what it meant to be a Helljumper, the best men and women the UNSC had to offer.

Jason considered grabbing a knife from one of them to replace his, but decided against it. It didn't feel right. Guns were interchangeable, bullets and grenades were spent and replaced freely, even armor could be easily replaced. But a Helljumper's knife was a very personal thing to them. There were no parts that you could swap out to make it function any better, nothing you could do to make it faster or improve it, you could only sharpen it and practice with it. it was already the ultimate instrument of death.

Instead, Jason removed the memory cards from all three ODSTs' helmets to review later. With any luck, he would be able to get them back to the higher ups so they could put together a better picture of what had happened down here

Jason had only been walking for about ten minutes past the last ODSTs body before he found something that made him stop.

Another while Company's worth of drop pods filled the street, but they looked abandoned. The only thing indicating where the ODSTs might have gone was a dead Jackal patrol a little bit further up the street.

Jason started jogging forward towards where he could only hope the other Company of Helljumpers had gone.

As he jogged onwards, he saw more and more signs of UNSC activity, three more dead Jackal patrols and five dead Elites, all with no obvious human casualties. _If I can catch up to them, then I might be able to catch a ride back to the ship._

After thirty minutes of jogging, Jason Smiths came up on an intersection and stopped dead in his tracks. The scene on his right horrified him, and he stood there for several minutes just taking it in.

The Company had been ambushed.

He slowly walked forward, carefully making his way through the corpses. Bodies on both ends of the street were riddled with holes made by some sort of heavy plasma rifle. After examining the battleground for several minutes, he thought that he had figured out what had happened, but he wanted to be sure.

Jason walked up to one of the Helljumpers with an intact helmet and removed the memory card, slotting it into his own helmet. The men hadn't been dead for more than a day, so he didn't have to go back far in the memory.

When Jason found the spot where the Company was ambushed, he went back a few more minutes to when they were turning the corner.

The Helljumper was near the middle of the pack, and from where he was, Jason was able to see how the Sergeant Major had laid out the company for traveling. At the very front walked five ODSTs with M41 Rocket Launchers, followed by troops with MA5C ICWS Assault Rifles which were loaded with 32 Armor Piercing Full Metal Jacket rounds. The Sergeant Major was walking a few steps ahead of the Helljumper whose helmet cam recording Jason had taken.

Jason watched as the Company finished turning the corner, wondering when exactly it was going to go wrong. The company was roughly at the midpoint of the street when the Covenant struck.

Ten Ghosts turned the corner and began racing down the street towards the front of the company. The Helljumpers turned, looking behind them, and Jason could see that there were ten more Ghosts were racing towards the back of the group as well. They were trapped, with nowhere to go.

"Open fire!" The Sergeant Major shouted. Five rockets sailed from the tubes of the M41 rocket launchers, al heading towards the Ghosts in the front. The rockets were leading the Ghosts by several feet, so when all ten braked and opened fire, all five rockets fell short of their targets.

When the Ghosts opened fire, men started falling immediately. No one could stand up to the Twin Plasma Cannons on the front of the single occupant vehicles, and the large scale plasma rounds were quickly cutting into the Company of highly trained soldiers. The first to go had been the soldiers with Rocket Launchers, since they offered the biggest threat.

However, the Helljumpers were quickly putting up a resistance, firing at the Ghosts and putting them down one by one. It was looking better and better for the ODSTs, they were easily going to destroy the Ghosts before even a fourth of them were wiped out.

Suddenly, a single shot rang out, this one different than the rest. It was high pitched and accompanied by a bright blue beam of light that slashed downward through the air and drilled a perfect hole through the head of the Sergeant Major. There was a temporary lull in the outgoing fire, a gap that was quickly filled with a hail of Energy Bolts from the rooftops on either side.

The owner of the helmet cam looked up, seeing the shooters for the first time. There were over twenty Jackals with Beam Rifles lining the rooftops to either side. The sniper fire was pouring in, forcing the Helljumpers to split their fire between the Ghosts and the Jackals.

The ODSTs never stood a chance against the better organized and more heavily armed Covenant troops. They were falling in droves, between the snipers and Ghosts; the Company was reduced to a few troops in a matter of seconds.

The man whose camera Jason had tapped into was one of the last that fell, so he was able to watch as the Company was decimated. Man after man was falling to the combined fire of the Covenant, and eventually, Jason heard a loud scream and watched as the camera angle quickly changed. It was sideways now, laying flat on the ground.

There was one Helljumper left standing, still firing on the snipers. The Ghosts had stopped shooting; they were letting the Jackals finish them off. The last ODST standing was facing away from the Majority of the Ghosts, so he couldn't see the Golden armored Elite dismount and start to slowly approach from behind.

Jason watched in silence as the Elite walked up to the Helljumper from behind, pulling an unlit Energy Sword handle from his waist as he did so.

When the Elite was only a step away from the ODST, he lit the sword and lunged. The Energy Blade stabbed straight through the man, jutting over a foot out of the front of his torso.

The Elite lifted the man into the air, causing him to sink down even further on the sword. The Elite said something garbled in its own language, and then tossed the dead Helljumper to the side.

Jason continued to watch the footage until the remaining Ghosts drove off and everything was still.

He pulled the memory card from his helmet and held it in his hand, staring at it for several minutes. He thought about what he had seen on the video, the Company getting completely wiped out just like his had been.

Jason slid the memory chip into a compartment of his pack, making sure that it was ell secured before he stood up and began to jog back towards the drop pods that he had passed roughly an hour ago. If he could gather supplies and make it back to his room, then he would consider the day to have been as productive as possible. Gathering supplies was a key part of any operation.

Jason stopped before he reached the edge of the battleground. He turned around, thinking of a fitting thing that he could do to show his respect for the dead.

He made his way back to the far edge of the slaughter ground. He picked up a soldier's SMG, the silenced version of the M7 Caseless Submachine Gun. This was the bread and butter of every ODST's arsenal, either the main weapon or the back up for everyone there.

Jason removed the magazine from the gun. There were ten rounds left, and he took all of them out, holding them in his hand. He crouched next to the Soldier once again, making sure that his camera recorded the soldier's service tag. He rolled the soldier onto his back and laid him out straight, arms at his sides and legs together.

Jason then forced the Helljumper's right hand to close around one of the 5 x 23 mm rounds and rested the hand on the ODST's chest. The weight of the armor helping to counteract the rigor mortis and keeping him arranged like Jason had laid him out.

Jason Smiths then moved over to the next soldier and did the same thing, making sure that his camera caught this soldier's service tag too. As he recorded each tag, he had his helmet automatically save a picture of each and create a typed list or each, so he would have them written down for later; _if I ever make it off this Damn planet._

It took him almost four hours to do this for every one of the two hundred and fifty dead soldiers in the Company, but he felt better for having done it. About halfway through, he had picked up two MA5C Assault Rifles and reloaded them before placing them in his pack as best he could, since a few inches of both rifles stuck out the top. He then filled his still mostly empty pack with as many fully loaded Assault Rifle magazines as it would hold.

_I might want to swap my SMG for the Rifle at some point. The increased firepower and range might be useful later on._

Once he finished with the last soldier, he stood and immediately realized just how tired he was. He almost couldn't stand on his own, but he managed to push himself to his feet. Jason pulled out a stim designed to wake him up and give him the strength to keep going. As he stabbed it into his thigh, he felt immediately better, but knew that he wouldn't be able to make it back to his room tonight.

_It I can make it back to their drop pods, I can find some food and I can crash in one of the SOEIVs for the night. _He started back towards the pods, which he knew to be roughly an hour away if he was walking instead of running like he had been earlier.

As he made his way towards the drop pods, he started to see signs of more recent Covenant activity, and that worried him. If he could make it to the pods then he'd be fine, he could close the hatch and hide for the night. The pods were designed so that something similar could be done. They had external ports that could be opened so that they weren't air tight and you could breathe without worrying about your air supply.

He thought about which pod he wanted to use while he walked. _A SOEIV on the outside edge would let me escape faster, but one towards the middle would let me hide better. _It was a tough decision that could mean the difference between life and death for him.

_Middle, _He decided. It would definitely be better to hide from a horde of Covenant rather than try and run from them.

Jason was about fifteen minutes away from the drop pods and he was ready to sit down and sleep. He was cradling his M7S Submachine Gun in his arms, his M90 CAWS Shotgun on its sling on his back. He kept walking along, hoping that he wasn't going to run into any resistance between here and the group of pods.

He walked for five more minutes before he came up on a small strip of shops with big windows, most of which were shattered. He heard a scream.

He switched to his Shotgun and get ready to enter the small shop. He kicked in the door just in time to see a Marine with an M6G Pistol standing in the hallway firing into a doorway. He carried a pouch, but other than his pistol, he was empty handed. Jason started running towards him, but he didn't make it in time.

Ten bright blue blobs of plasma shot through the doorway in rapid succession and impacted the Marine's arms and chest, killing him almost instantly. Jason made sure that there was a shell in the chamber of his shotgun and quietly made his way to the door.

His motion sensor showed that there was only one of them inside the room, and judging on the weaponry used to kill the Marine, he felt that it was safe to assume that it was a Brute that he was now facing.

He was just outside the doorway, and he could hear the Brute coming towards him. He exhaled quietly. _I only have one shot at this, _he thought to himself. The Brute wasn't rushing to the door to kill him, which meant that it probably didn't know that he was there.

Jason pointed his shotgun across the doorway, finger on the trigger, and waited until he could see his target.

As soon as the Brute's head extended into the doorframe, Jason pressed the muzzle of the M90 CAWS 8 Gauge shotgun against the Brute's temple and gently squeezed the trigger.

The trigger released the spring, the spring pushed the pin, the pin impacted the firing cap, the firing cap ignited, the gunpowder ignited, 15 9.5 mm pellets were pushed out of the front of the Soellkraft 8 Gauge Shotgun shell, they raced down the barrel, the pellets exited the barrel and immediately impacted the Brute's temple, they reached the midpoint of the Brute's head, they broke the sound barrier, the shockwave caused the Brute's head to go away, and the pellets finished their journey when they lodged themselves in the far wall.

Jason racked the slide; pulling it back and slamming it forward again just as the Brute's body crashed to the floor. Jason glanced down at the body, making sure that it wasn't going to get up. He had seen Brutes take far more than a single shotgun shell and keep going, and he didn't want to turn his back and have him get up again.

He stepped over the Brute's body and crouched down next to the Marine. He looked like he hadn't slept in days, and he certainly hadn't been able to shave. Jason examined the pouch that he had been carrying. It was full of magazines for the Marine's M6G Pistol. The rounds were fully compatible with Jason's M6C SOCOM, which was good because the Brute's plasma bolts had melted the Marine's sidearm and the rounds for the Marine's gun were far more powerful that the standard rounds for Jason's sidearm.

Jason slung the pouch over his shoulder and stood up. The Marine had carried five full combat loads of Pistol ammunition, which was also good, because now Jason wouldn't have to keep an eye out for handgun ammo, and he could upgrade to the more powerful ammo type.

He swapped clips in his pistol before squatting down beside the Marine once again. He reached out and gently pulled his dog tags from around his neck. Jason slid them into a compartment on his armor, making sure that they weren't at risk of falling out.

He stood up again and walked back out the door in the front of the store. He started to continue his walk to the pods that he intended to spend the night in, hoping that he would be able to get there without any further incidents like the one he had just gone through.

Ten minutes later, Jason had reached the pods. He looked inside each one he passed, grabbing small amounts of supplies from each. Finally, he reached the center, and selected the pod that he was going to sleep in.

It had been the pod of another sniper, like he was. It was lined with 12.7 x 114 mm APFSDS magazines, and it made him feel at home.

He clambered inside and sat down, closing the hatch. The pod was small, but after dozens of drops, and hundreds of simulated drops, it felt comfortable, and maybe even a little roomy. He was able to spread himself out some, since the gear that was usually inside the pod had been taken by the pods deceased owner.

Jason ate quickly, he was extremely hungry after the work he had done today. As soon as he finished eating, he strapped himself in and drifted off to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

_Okay guys, Chapter five is so long that i'll be posting this first segment now, and then the rest of it later. The rest of it is told from Carris' point of view, and starts at roughly the same time as James' story does. It will end with them meeting up, but that's all I'm going to say. it's going to be in the same chapter though, so the next update won't add a new chapter, just double the size of this one._

**Chapter 5**

**D + 00:23:07 (Spartan-005 James Mission Clock) / Space Dock Gamma, in orbit above Reach**

James was diligently working on unstrapping the Explosives from the front of the Pelican Dropship, but it was taking longer than he expected, and was made much more complicated by the lack of gravity on the station.

James-005, Linda-058, and John-117 had only just boarded the station, and things were already going poorly. They had had a rough landing that had left their Pelican crippled and no longer flyable. The high explosives that were strapped to the nose of the ship had been placed there to help them blast their way through Space Dock Gamma to _The Circumference_. There was an intact NAV computer on board that needed to be wiped due to Cole Protocol, and it had somehow been overlooked when the Covenant started arriving in-system.

Unfortunately, since their Dropship was crippled, the explosives weren't in a position to be used effectively. So James was tasked with removing them so they could place them where they needed to go.

The mission was already faltering and straying from the established plan, and James was more than a bit concerned. The station was probably crawling with Covenant troops by now, and if they showed up, then just three Spartans might not be enough to secure the data onboard _The Circumference_ and make it back to _The Pillar of Autumn_.

Plasma flashed overhead. _Crap, _James thought. The shots were large and probably ship-based. And they weren't hitting with very much accuracy, so at the moment they didn't concern him. He only became concerned when the large rounds stopped, and Plasma Rifle and Needler rounds started impacting his armor's shields and the Dropship all around him.

"Take cover," John said. James glanced at his motion sensor and saw that John and Linda had taken cover behind a ship on the opposite side of the platform. He would have listened to them and taken cover, but was almost done freeing the explosives, and he needed to keep shielding them with his body. If a stray plasma round or a Needler crystal struck them, then this mission would end very quickly. There were enough explosives here to blow through ten centimeters of Titanium-A Battleplate, and they needed these explosives to reach _The Circumference_.

"Blue-two," John said, a touch of concern creeping into his tone, "I said fall back."

Just after he said that, James felt his shields go down, and a shower of Needler crystals impact his side, and felt one hit his thruster harness. _Shit, _he thought; _please don't let that have punctured._

Half a second later, he felt the needles that had struck his armor detonate, along with the one that had punctured the tank on his thruster harness. The gasses inside the tank exploded outward, sending James rocketing across the station.

James hit a wall hard, and he heard something in his helmet pop. He bounced off the wall and realized that he was headed out to space. _Damn, this is bad, _he thought. _I have to keep my head. If an opportunity presents itself then I have o be prepared to take it._

"Blue-two…" James heard. John was trying to contact him, "… in." so it was something in his Comms that had made the popping noise. He knew then what it had been, and it was bad. There was a chip that had the tendency to pop out when there was an exceptionally hard impact on the helmet, and without it, Comms shut off. _I should put in a request to have that fixed. _He thought.

"Can't control spin," James said, knowing that they probably couldn't hear him/ his pack was no longer venting air, but he was still rapidly moving away from the station. He caught a brief glimpse of the tiny specs that were his friends on the enormous station. The shipyard was swarming with Covenant troops. "They've boarded in mass. They're everywhere, hurry up and reach _The Circumference_."

James knew that there was nothing more he could say. The chip in his helmet had most likely fallen out completely now, and he was over three Kilometers out from Space Dock Gamma. He couldn't provide any useful information at this point. He needed to figure out how to stop his spin.

His shoulder hit a large piece of melted Battleplate; a remnant of one of the many ships that had been destroyed in orbit recently. It hurt, and completely drained his shields again, but now he was facing in the direction that he was heading, and that was a start.

James glanced at his shield bar. It was still flashing red, and the alarm continued to blare in his helmet. His shields weren't recharging. He started the system's reboot process, but knew that that took almost a minute to complete, which left James vulnerable when he entered a large cloud of small debris left over from the space battles nearby.

None of the pieces were larger than a few centimeters in diameter, and they were mostly solid chunks of Titanium-A with sharp, jagged edges that were probably caused by explosions from within the ships that they originated from. Some were fresh enough to still be glowing white hot, and as he smashed his way through the cloud of metal shrapnel, he could hear some of the pieces scraping his armor.

He carefully looked up, making sure to not alter his current trajectory, which could have sent his wildly spinning again. He had to see where he was going. Unfortunately, the debris field that he was in was preventing him from seeing anything further than a foot away from him. It was also preventing his shields from recharging, since every time they started to restart, they were knocked offline again by a piece of floating metal.

James glanced at a display on his HUD. He had about twenty minutes of Oxygen left before he wouldn't be able to breathe. _That's not a death I'd particularly like to have to go through._

Just as James was starting to lose hope, he broke through, and was free of the debris and junk that he had been flying through for the last ten minutes. Unfortunately, he now had a new problem. There was a Covenant Dropship directly in front of him, and he was going to hit it in a matter of seconds.

He noticed that the side hatch that he was heading towards was wide open, allowing him to see much of the inside. It looked abandoned.

James was able to use the movement of his arms, and his knowledge of inertia and physics, to redirect himself so that he landed inside the ship. Once he landed, James carefully worked his way through the Dropship to the controls, where he found a flash frozen, and very much dead, Elite still strapped into the pilot's chair.

_Doesn't matter, _he thought, _I wouldn't have fit in the chair anyways. _The gravity was still off, so James hovered over the controls. Everything was dark, and he hoped that that didn't mean that the ship was completely dead in space.

There was a single floating red button on the very outskirts of the pilot's console, and James reached to towards it. _I would assume that this would be what powers up the ship, since there's only one button._

James managed to plant his feet on the floor and engage the magnetic clamps just as he tapped the button. The result was that he felt the ship hum to life beneath him, and watched as the controls sprang to life and lit up all around him. Lights were coming on all throughout the ship, and James disengaged the clamps on his boots before leaving the control board for a moment, carefully making his way back into the troop compartment. He slowly worked his way back to the open hatch, taking great care to not propel himself out of it.

There was a small control by the open hatch that James felt safe to assume was the control panel for it. He tapped the largest and most central of the floating, light based buttons, and then happily watched as the doors closed and sealed themselves. He went back up to the cockpit. There were a series of controls near the button that he had used to turn the ship back on, arranged in a column below it.

His translation software had been updated recently to better accommodate his needs for the mission that the Spartans had been on before coming here. Though it was never put into place, the intent had been for them to board and capture a Covenant capital ship, and use it to trick the Covenant and bring an end to the war.

James now let his translation software go to work on the column of buttons, and it only took it a moment to give him a readout. Artificial Gravity, Pressurize, Depressurize, Shields, and Self Destruct. _Why the hell would they have a self destruct?_ He wondered. He pressed the Artificial Gravity button, and was relieved when he fell to the deck of the ship. _That's one problem solved_, he thought to himself.

He pressed Pressurize. He watched on the display as the ship made sure that all the seals were in place. When it confirmed that the Phantom could indeed hold air, it began to repressurize with highly compressed tanks of air that were stored somewhere on board.

It only took a couple of minutes for the Phantom to slowly pressurize itself, and once James confirmed that there was indeed breathable oxygen, he allowed himself a small smile. Something was finally going his way.

His armor was refilling its small backup reserves of oxygen, and replenishing the scrubbers that allowed him to recycle air for ninety minutes at a time.

He looked down at the controls again, then at the view screens. He watched as a Pelican Dropship sailed past in the distance, heading away from Space Dock Gamma and making its way off screen. _They completed their mission then, _he thought. _John wouldn't leave unless he had managed to destroy the NAV data on _The Circumference.

James considered trying to follow the Pelican back to _The Autumn, _but without working Comms, he would be blown out of the air the second they saw him.

He considered trying to use the Phantom's communications systems, but he didn't have the slightest idea on how they worked, and he would most likely only wind up alerting any Covenant ship in the area to his presence.

_I should try and make my way planetside. From there I could catch a ride back up to the fleet, or I could get orders and make myself useful. _James' hands hovered over the controls that he could only assume directed the vehicle's motion.

He tapped one, and the ship jerked upwards. He lightly touched another, this one directly below the first button he had touched, and this time, the Phantom slowly moved downwards. James experimented will all of the controls in front of him, quickly getting a hang of how the ship worked. He tapped the button that controlled the shields, and saw the pieces of floating junk get propelled away from the invisible energy barrier that materialized in place around the Phantom.

_Good, now I just have to get down to the surface. _He began to slowly move the Phantom forward, before gently turning it towards the planet below. They hadn't had had time to be briefed on all the major cities of Reach, so James didn't know which cities were which once he came within visual range.

James could see several Covenant ships converged on one location. _That's probably where the Orbital Defense Station's generators are. _It would be suicidal to try and land there. The Covenant would try and hail him, and failing that, they would certainly shoot him down. James spotted another major city; this one had only one cruiser hovering over it. He headed towards it.

James reached the outer atmosphere after about twenty minutes of flying, and only then realized that he had very little idea what he was doing. The ship was jerking around, and he had to fight hard to keep it from spinning out of control.

James was now plummeting towards the city, descending far more rapidly than he wanted to be. Based on what he could see, James estimated that he would be impacting the ground in roughly one minute, at an approximate rate of three hundred Kilometers an hour.

His hands sped across the controls, desperately trying to control his descent. He managed to get the nose of the craft up, so he was falling straight down, belly first. The shield was fading, the friction between it and the atmosphere was creating too much friction and heat at this speed, and it didn't take long for it to give out. An alarm started to blare in the cockpit, and that's when it started to get hot.

The hull of the Phantom was only on fire for a short time before James managed to get it under control and steady out his descent to the planet below. He flew down at an even, controlled rate now, quickly reaching the rooftops of the higher buildings and flying over them in a horizontal path. He saw a good roof in the distance to set down on; one that would provide him with plenty of room for what would surely be a rough landing.

James saw something alarming on his view screens. To his left, he saw a pelican Dropship, which under normal circumstances would have been a very welcome sight, but he was in a Covenant craft. To his right, he saw something even worse; another Phantom, this one heading straight for the Pelican.

The pilot of the Pelican didn't seem to see this threat, and instead was heading straight for James. James saw the other Phantom open fire, but for now it was too far away for it to be able to hit the Pelican with any sort of accuracy, and most of its first volley went wide. James left the pilots station and quickly slid over to the weapons chair. He started pressing buttons, and a targeting reticule immediately popped up on the screen in front of him.

James quickly discovered how to aim and fire, and targeted the other Phantom, firing a salvo of his own. James' shots started connecting, and the other ship quickly redirected its shots towards him.

It was only now that James realized that in his haste, he hadn't reactivated the shields. He sprang back over to the pilot's station and reactivated them. They struggled to life, and immediately went down again due to the incoming plasma rounds that splashed across it when it flickered to life. James saw the Pelican redirect its attention to the other Phantom and begin to fire its 70mm chin mounted Chain gun.

The Phantom continued to fire on James, and after a few more seconds, he lost his starboard engines. He quickly began spiraling out of control, thankfully heading in the direction of a small building that might be able to absorb some of his momentum.

He was two hundred meters above the ground now. _This is a bad idea. _He realized. _This ship is going to explode when it hits the building, and I don't want to be on board for that. _He sprinted for the hatch and engaged the hatch release panel, watching in frustration as it slowly hissed open.

As soon as it opened enough for him to be able to exit the rapidly descending craft, he thrust himself out of it.

He was still about ten stories in the air, and moving forward towards a building. James locked his armor's joints and set all shields to full, finishing both tasks seconds before he sailed through a foot and a half thick concrete wall and tumbling to a stop towards the top of the office building.

The self adjusting layer in his armor over compensated for the impact, pressurizing to save him from the hit, but causing him to black out.

James was on his back, his limbs locked tightly against his body with the armor's joints still firmly locked. He had broken his nose when he had hit, and his blood covered the inside of his helmet; but he neither knew, nor cared.


End file.
